Connected: An Internet Encyclopedia
Socket

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### Socket

A socket is a network communications endpoint. The analogy is to a wire (the network data connection) being pluged into a socket.

Sockets come in two primary flavors. An active socket is connected to a remote active socket via an open data connection. Closing the connection destroys the active sockets at each endpoint. A passive socket is not connected, but rather awaits an incomming connection, which will spawn a new active socket.

A socket is not a port, though there is a close relationship between them. A socket is associated with a port, though this is a many-to-one relationship. Each port can have a single passive socket, awaiting incomming connections, and multiple active sockets, each corresponding to an open connection on the port.

Connected: An Internet Encyclopedia
Socket